Due to the high potential of miniaturization and integration, with regard to the innovation degree, quality and sustainability requirements, the 21st century looks forward to the integration of new functions on plastic parts to produce smart plastic products, as markets are requiring traceability, security, communication as well as ergonomics.
So called Molded Interconnected Devices (MID) basically combine all the features of molded plastic parts with electrical conductive circuitry and electronics components assembly directly on the plastic packaging. MID lead finally to highly integrated multimaterial and multifunctional 3D compact systems. With a 20% of growth per year since 2008, MID is the tomorrows converging technology for electronics and plastics.
To achieve advanced high precision and high quality 3D micro systems, the EU industry is facing the following MIDs bottlenecks:
- to be able to manufacture high precision 3D micro-parts integration plastics and electronics, including 3D plastic system carrier, 3D-conductive tracks and 3D electronics component assembly
- to be able to reduce the manufacturing cost by 50% in order for EU industry to be competitive with low-wage countries,
- to provide the industry with reliable, robust and in-line controlled manufacturing processes for plastics and electronics converging technologies.
3D-HiPMAS will overcome these challenges by providing the EU industry with a pilot factory based on 4 key technological building blocks enabling the manufacturing of low costs and high precision 3D multi-materials parts:
A. 3D high precision plastics micro-parts
B. 3D high definition conductive tracks
C. 3D precision electronics components assembly
D. 3D reliable and robust online monitoring and quality inspection system
E. These 4 technologies will be integrated in order to launch the future EU pilot factory
The consortium is composed of all key actors from the value chain, from the material manufacturer to the end-user

A system for providing hearing assistance having: an audio signal source; a transmission unit transmitting audio signals as data packets in a frame structure; a receiver unit for receiving audio signals from the transmission unit and associated with an ear-worn device having a power source and a hearing stimulator, and having a digital transceiver powered by the power source of the ear-worn device with a value between lower and upper limits. The transceiver listens, and optionally transmits, during part of each frame and otherwise sleeps. The receiver unit has a capacitor connected in parallel to the transceiver for supplying the transceiver with current during listening or transmission. A controlled current for controlling current flowing from the power source to the transceiver and the capacitor. The controlled current source has a DC/DC converter with an input connected to the power source and an output voltage connected to the capacitor.

A hearing aid device (3) with an active occlusion control feature is fitted to a particular user. An occlusion control compensator filter (9) is configured with a dataset C. For finding an optimal dataset C various data is used, in particular data regarding a complex, frequency-dependent plant transfer function P from an input of a receiver (7) to an output of a canal microphone (8), data regarding an occlusion effect OE, data regarding a vent effect VE and/or data regarding a fundamental frequency F0 of the voice of the user. The optimal dataset C may be determined by a selection from a plurality of predefined raw datasets, such as C_(1), C_(2) and C_(3), and by a subsequent scaling with a scaling factor, such as g_(1), g_(2) and g_(3). Configurations with different datasets, such as C_(A) * g_(A) and C_(B) * g_(B), may be presented to the user for a subjective evaluation.

A shell (10) for a hearing device, and a method of producing the same. The shell (10) comprises a sub-shell (11) produced by a generative method, and a thermoformed hull (12) covering the subshell (11). The sub-shell (11) comprises lateral openings (13) covered by the thermoformed hull (12) so as to render the shell (10) more flexible in the region of the openings (13), and thereby to relieve pressure exerted by the shell (10) due to dynamic changes in the shape of the wearers ear canal during jaw movement.

A method of manufacturing an acoustic seal for a CIC hearing aid has the steps of: embedding sacrificial particles of 50 m to 250 m into a silicone rubber matrix, the concentration and size of the sacrificial particles being selected to achieve a porosity of at least 40%; molding the silicone rubber matrix using a mold and curing the silicone rubber matrix; removing the sacrificial particles from the silicone rubber matrix by leaching out the sacrificial particles in a solvent; and drying the silicone rubber matrix. The seal is to surround at least part of the hearing aid and by selection of the size and/or concentration and/or the distribution of the sacrificial particles, to provide for an acoustic attenuation of at least 20 dB in a frequency range between 200 Hz and 6 kHz, with a compliance of at least 50 mm/N when the hearing aid is inserted into the ear canal.

A hearing device is proposed comprising at least one microphone (1), at least one analog-to-digital converter (2), a signal processing unit (3), a communication unit (6) for establishing and/or maintaining a communication link to a second hearing device, and a detection unit (7) for determining a communication link quality. The at least one microphone (1) is operationally connected to the signal processing unit (3) via the at least one analog-to-digital converter (2), and the communication unit (6) is operationally connected to the signal processing unit (3). By providing said detection unit (7), which is operationally connected to the communication unit (6), together with a processing scheme selectable in the signal processing unit (3) in accordance to a determined communication link quality, a binaural hearing system with two hearing devices is for able to adjust its mode in line with the communication link quality, and therewith with its capacity.

A hearing device comprising a battery compartment including a metal-air battery and a microphone assembly arranged nearby or coupled to the battery compartment, the battery compartment and/or the microphone assembly in protected using an elastic polymer membrane.

An analysis filter bank decomposes a microphone signal into sub-band signals, a gain unit applies a frequency-dependent gain to the sub-band signals, and a synthesis filter bank converts the amplified sub-band signals into a signal, which is then output by a receiver. A first adaptive filter of a feedback canceler provides feedback compensation signals adapted to compensate acoustic feedback from the receiver to the microphone, whereby the feedback compensation signals are subtracted from corresponding signals from the sub-band signals. A second adaptive filter of the feedback canceler estimates cross-frequency signal components resulting from aliasing of signal components from one sub-band into one or more neighbouring sub-bands caused by non-ideal sub-band signal decomposition in the analysis filter bank with overlapping sub-bands. Thereby, the first adaptive filter is adapted in dependence of the estimated cross-frequency signal components.

A hearing aid device (1) is provided with a lockable battery compartment. The battery door (2) is pivotable relatively to a device body (4) around an axis (5). The battery door (2) can be secured in its closed position by a clamping means (3). The first end (8) of the clamping means (3) snaps into a recess (7) within the battery door (2). The second end of the clamping means (3) is mounted rotatably on the device body (4). It shares an axis (6) with a rocker element of a volume control (11). The clamping means (3) exerts a closing force on the battery door (2). This contributes to the protection of the device against ingress, for example of water.